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MLive reader realizes connection to 3,000-pound Masonic stone; see what was found

Bob Kubiak holds a coin he is donating to the Masonic stone and its time capsule at the Masonic Temple of Grand Rapids on Friday, October 25, 2013. Kubiak's father, a collector of coins, had the coin stored away in a safe.
(Lauren Petracca | MLive.com)

GRAND RAPIDS, MI — A Masonic time capsule containing a coin, letters and other small items wasn't to be opened until 1999 — 75 years after the dedication of the Masonic Country Club in Walker.

But the instruction apparently was disregarded years after the ceremony. A door holding the capsule inside a 3,000-pound stone was pried open and its contents removed.

Nobody, nor any Freemason living in the area has come forward to give guidance on where to find the capsule that has been lost to time, almost like the stone itself before it was discovered several years ago by Michael Clark, a local Freemason.

It also detailed the stone's original home at the golf course, a place called the "Cryptic Deposit."

That's when the light bulb came on, said Kubiak, who contacted the Press.

"My dad left me a safe when he died (in the 1980s,) and I cut it open, maybe five or six years ago," he said. "At the time, I didn't think much about it. A bunch of foreign coins."

But the description of some deposit on the coin caught his eye while reading the article.

"The story had all the same information on the coin, the country club's name, the bury and open dates," said Kubiak, who soon contacted Clark to donate the coin Friday afternoon.

Upon meeting, the two men couldn't help but dive into Grand Rapids' history of Masonry.

Kubiak removed his glasses a few times, hoping to get a better look in the past at some of Clark's old articles and photos describing the country club and the coin, which likely was pressed with a few others of its kind before the golf course opened in the mid 1920s, Clark said.

Even the hometown hero, Clark explained, former President Gerald R. Ford, was a Mason.

"It's kind of surreal right now," said Kubiak, who suffers from a congenital form of amyloidosis, a disease caused by an abnormal production of insoluble proteins. "I've survived a lot of transplants and have asked, 'Why am I here, why am I here?'

"But I'm part of something that is so deep in history."

A new time capsule is scheduled to go into the stone during a ceremony sometime in 2015, which will be the Temple building's 100th anniversary. The coin will go inside it and not be opened for 50 years, Clark said.

Kubiak said he'll gladly accept Clark's offer to place it inside the stone.

Perhaps this time, it won't be disturbed.

Andrew Krietz covers breaking and general police/fire news for MLive | The Grand Rapids Press. Email him at akrietz@mlive.com or follow him on Twitter.